Big Burke announcement

[thetrailboss]

i know a lot of people on here have taken a "something had to change" position with the old management team. but they didn't seem to have these kinds of snowmaking/water issues and could put out a decent product for x-mas week. and that's without the supposed upgrades to snowmaking they've claimed the last two seasons.

seems to me jr got his early mantra of "doing more with less" flipped and he's actually "doing less with more" than the previous team.

unless, of course, the less he was referring to was knowledge and experience. if that's the case, i'm not sure what the more is?

+ 1. Hence my comment about bringing Ginn back!

 

[Gman]

QB FB page now says they are confident that they will be open for skiing/riding no later that 12/18.

 

[VTKilarney]

That explains the hotel rooms being pulled.


.

 

[thetrailboss]

QB FB page now says they are confident that they will be open for skiing/riding no later that 12/18.

That is until this time next week when they don't have any water (still)....

 

[Smellytele]

That explains the hotel rooms being pulled.


.

what about the ones that were already booked or was the booking so low it doesn't matter anyway?

 

[VTKilarney]

what about the ones that were already booked or was the booking so low it doesn't matter anyway?

My guess is that they are offering refunds. Just a guess, though.


.

 

[MEtoVTSkier]

Water levels are back and we are pumping to replenish the snow making pond. We anticipate firing back up the system this evening and will continue to make snow as long as we can. The gameplan will be to finish the summit trails (Upper/Lower Willoughby and Upper Bear Den), then move to the Warrens Way training hill to get BMA online. With that being said and to avoid any additional false hope, we feel confident we will be opening for skiing and riding no later than Friday, December 18th. We will do our best to get open prior to that and will continue to keep everyone posted.

I wonder how long they can blow snow without filling the pond simultaneously.

 

[River19]

My guess is that they are offering refunds. Just a guess, though.


.

I thought the Q Checkbook only worked one way?

 

[VTKilarney]

Some thoughts:

1) The first night that I am finding availability at the hotel is January 15th. Make of that what you will.

2) I appreciate their candor about when they believe they can get the mountain open. Unfortunately, if they can only open by December 18th, this pretty much guarantees that there will be very little terrain open for Christmas week unless there is natural snow.

3) Ironically, warm weather is going to be Burke's best friend for a while. Why? Well, what pissed people off last year was just how far behind the curve Burke was for the Christmas week. Trail counts don't lie (so long as you account for trail count inflation), and Burke's trail count was AWFUL. If NOBODY can make snow, Burke won't look as bad as they looked last year when it had more to do with the fact that they couldn't keep up with the competition. But this is just kicking the can down the road. When snowmaking weather returns the competition will increase trail counts MUCH faster than Burke will be able to.

4) It would be a good gesture if they allowed Burke-only passholders to ski at Jay until Burke opens. I would normally say "too bad" for those who didn't pay extra for the Jay Peak add-on, but people bought Burke passes with the understanding that snowmaking would be improved. Burke failed to deliver on their promise, even if the weather has been warm, so this would be a good gesture to make up for their gaffe.

 

[VTKilarney]

Here is a chart showing the river levels at the closest location I could find to the ski resort:

 

[VTKilarney]

I went back and looked at some previous posts in this thread when they were having so many problems with snowmaking last year. A lot of Q Burke's Facebook posts/comments were quoted. Many of those posts/comments have since been deleted on Facebook by Q Burke. But they are preserved here.

In post #2700, I quoted a comment that Burke made on their Facebook page. Part of that comment was this:
"According to our "masters of snow" our HDK guns can produce 15 gpm of snow at 26F, 30 gpm at 22F, and 50 gpm at 18F. Again, keeping in mind that we are at "full" capacity with 30 guns running at a time."

Burke's own snowmaking updates this year have said that they are running 25 guns at a time. So I ask, where is the improvement in snowmaking? You know... the promised improvements?

 

[from_the_NEK]

I always thought that the Pond as deeper than that. And, FWIW, that list is a bit deceiving because both Burke and Sugarbush North's ponds are refilled from other sources.

All ponds are filled from some source or another. And when that other source doesn't have enough water to refill the pond, you are screwed. Having a bigger pond that can be filled to stockpile water when the levels from the source are high (see Nov 21st above) can be important.

 

[thetrailboss]

I went back and looked at some previous posts in this thread when they were having so many problems with snowmaking last year. A lot of Q Burke's Facebook posts/comments were quoted. Many of those posts/comments have since been deleted on Facebook by Q Burke. But they are preserved here.

In post #2700, I quoted a comment that Burke made on their Facebook page. Part of that comment was this:
"According to our "masters of snow" our HDK guns can produce 15 gpm of snow at 26F, 30 gpm at 22F, and 50 gpm at 18F. Again, keeping in mind that we are at "full" capacity with 30 guns running at a time."

Burke's own snowmaking updates this year have said that they are running 25 guns at a time. So I ask, where is the improvement in snowmaking? You know... the promised improvements?

As I noted, the "improvements" were to pumping more water instead of more air. They need more of the latter.

 

[thetrailboss]

All ponds are filled from some source or another. And when that other source doesn't have enough water to refill the pond, you are screwed. Having a bigger pond that can be filled to stockpile water when the levels from the source are high (see Nov 21st above) can be important.

Right, but I mean that both ponds get water pumped into them from a river or another storage area.

 

[thetrailboss]

My guess is that they are offering refunds. Just a guess, though.


.

I HIGHLY doubt that they are giving money back; probably just giving folks a voucher to come stay another time.

 

[River19]

OK so based on their own FB posts from last year, the guns they had then produced 15 gpm at 26 degrees and it increases a lot as temps drop......and for the next 2 weeks they are looking at OVERNIGHT lows in the 25-32 degree range and during the day above freezing with some rain mixed in. Doesn't sound like the cards are stacked in the favor of great snow making going on the next 2 weeks heading to 12/18......but who knows.......

To VTK's point above, they were running 30 guns last year......25 guns this year so far......is there any chance they are running more efficient guns this year......? or is it most likely the same stuff they have had.

 

[VTKilarney]

That's a good point. Snowmaking is not binary. For the foreseeable future, a small scale system is going to be operating at it's least efficient levels.

As for the 25 guns versus 30 guns, I recall hearing that they can add a few more guns when they are blowing snow lower on the mountain. Since the snowmaking to date has been on the upper mountain, this might explain the difference. But the critical point is that they haven't improved over last year, despite assurances that they would.

There has been a decent amount of ra*n today, so at least the river levels should improve.

In other news, I know of someone who won a free weekend at the hotel as part of an earlier promotion. Their reservation was pushed back from the 12th to the 19th. I'm not sure if this is because the hotel itself won't be open, or if it's because they wanted skiing to be available. Either way, it was the mountain that pushed their reservation back.

 

[MEtoVTSkier]

Can they not run the new fan guns and the air/water at the same time? Wasn't that the point of adding a new booster water pump for the upper mountain?

 

[VTKilarney]

Can they not run the new fan guns and the air/water at the same time? Wasn't that the point of adding a new booster water pump for the upper mountain?

They can if they have enough water...

 

[from_the_NEK]

Here is the discharge at the East Haven monitoring station about 2 miles upstream from Burke's intake. You can see the levels are well below median flow for this time of year.